[MS News]
Nepal
Tackling the problem of street dogs
The Kathmandu Animal Treatment Centre (KAT Centre) is using humane
methods to create a healthy, rabies-free, non-breeding street dog population
in Kathmandu, Nepal. Their Animal Birth Control (ABC) programme consists
of humanely catching female street dogs, spaying them, and vaccinating them
against rabies.
Kathmandu’s city government formerly poisoned around 10,000 animals every
year with strychnine; however, they have agreed not to continue this
inhumane practice in areas where the KAT Centre is working.
In September 2010 the KAT Centre and the government of Nepal conducted a
survey of the street dog population. The results show that since 2006, the
number of street dogs in urban Kathmandu decreased substantially, from
around 31,000 to approximately 22,500. The proportion of sterilised female
dogs increased from 15 per cent to 40 per cent. As a result, the dog
population is expected to decline significantly in the next generation.
The survey also looked at the adjacent city of Patan, which does not yet have
an ABC programme. It found that on average, people in Kathmandu treat
street dogs more kindly than people in Patan do. Furthermore, 59 per cent of
the dogs in Patan were unhealthy compared with 29 per cent in Kathmandu,
and 82 per cent had skin disease compared to 19 per cent in Kathmandu.
These figures clearly demonstrate that humane dog control methods benefit
street dogs and citizens. The KAT Centre is continuing its ABC programme
with the target of sterilising 75 per cent of the dogs in urban Kathmandu by
2015.
The Kathmandu Animal Treatment Centre
W: www.katcentre.org.np
E: katcentre@wlink.com.np
NB the photos accompanying this article need to be credited to Gerard Truffandier